


Just Like A Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy

by saintofnovember



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Angst, Anxious Crowley (Good Omens), Crowley Created the Stars (Good Omens), Emotional Crowley (Good Omens), Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Historical, Historical Accuracy, Historical References, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, Other, Queen - Freeform, Rated T for Sigmund Freud, Sentient Bentley (Good Omens), This is making it sound sad but it really is nice I promise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-12
Updated: 2020-07-12
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:40:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 16,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25217161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/saintofnovember/pseuds/saintofnovember
Summary: So I adore the headcanon that Crowley went to Freddie Mercury and cried about the whole “you go to fast for me” debacle, so,,, this is about that. Mostly. It is also a story about Crowley's anxiety, and learning about what it means to be human. It is also a story about stars. And a car. And two beings who, despite all odds, learn themselves well enough to learn each other.I really like the idea that Crowley and Aziraphale just… saunter vaguely downwards into love. no big declarations, or stuttery, awkward conversations, just them, as they’ve always been, being petty and kind and slipping into a freer way of being them. So this is my take on that. I hope you enjoy~
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 4
Kudos: 43





	1. I'll Be A Better Man Today

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title credits: "I'll Be Good" - Jaymes Young  
> A big thank you to my partner in crimes for listening to and helping with plot ideas and looking over my outlines and also for being generally supportive!! This is my longest fic as of yet and would not have happened without several people saying that going over 12k did not require an intervention, and actually was rather impressive. 
> 
> A disclaimer: I am not sure the exact way that Christianity goes but this is my fic so i get to say the rules
> 
> With the exception of chapter 2, all the historical/period stuff has been researched and made as close to historically accurate as i thought it could be!! (I am an absolute suckerTM for historical fics so this is my homage to them without full on getting into it right now lol) Credit for historical information goes to the wonderful world of wikipedia and my ap euro textbook i’m glad it’s summer and there are no more MLA sources to do.

It was a bright, clear Tuesday evening in late August of 1976 when Crowley shut the door of the Bentley and sauntered towards the door to the bookshop with an air of distinct gallantry. It had been a very long and boring decade, in which Crowley hadn’t seen much of Aziraphale at all, and as he was finally cracking, he felt it important to do so intentionally. 

Since their parting in 1967, after presenting him with a tartan thermos of holy water, Aziraphale seemed to have been using all the ethereal means he had at his disposal to avoid him. Crowley would have gone to great lengths to prove this if he had had to, including revealing the few times he’d lurked around the bookshop only to discover the angel nowhere to be found. (This was generally due to the fact Aziraphale  _ could _ be found hiding behind a bookcase full of very old and dusty shelf of mystery novels, a genre Crowley knew and detested, mostly for its facade of cheap thrill and terrible suspense and partially because it seemed like the sort of thing  _ his lot _ would have a lot of fun with.)

These instances had been few and far between, however, occurring only once or twice every few years. It wasn’t as though Crowley and Aziraphale were glued to each others’ sides- in fact, in the grand scheme of things, they rarely saw each other.

The world was rather large, after all, even if all the important things did somehow end up happening in Britain. Crowley had been to America (and had left rather quickly, too. There was far  _ too much _ of it for his taste. Why there was  _ so much  _ empty land and so many barren fields was beyond even his comprehension.) and found it rather dull, so traveled to Japan, and to Italy, Russia and Sweden, stopped for a while in New Zealand (he found their accents quite entertaining and their plants superb) before he returned, as he always had, to England. It was a curious thing, how he seemed to circle London; an indecisive, anxious vulture burdened by morality and so condemned to be discontent with its own existence. Every time he got farther away, Crowley felt the inexplicable  _ pull _ of London on him. 

_ Ineffable _ , whispered a suspiciously Aziraphale-sounding voice in his head. Crowley frowned and brushed the thought away with a wave of his hand, startling a passerby on the sidewalk outside the bookshop. 

So the world was big, but it wasn’t so big that they didn’t run into one another. In fact, they’d been making quite a habit of it for a number of centuries before Crowley went and ruined it with his  _ proposal _ . (Not that  _ he _ thought he was wrong in asking for holy water, but he felt, now, in the wake of Aziraphale’s cold shoulder, that he should have at least been a bit less stubborn.)

And then- in the passenger seat of Crowley’s own Bentley, no less- Aziraphale had told Crowley he  _ went too fast for him.  _ Oh, how those words had tormented him.  _ Too fast. Was diving into a lake of bubbling sulfur  _ too fast _?  _

Crowley had lay awake many a long night over the past decade, replaying the memory so hard it felt bruised. But however much it hurt, Crowley was ready to cauterize the wound and get over it. 

Because they’d been  _ friends.  _ Or as close to friends as they could be, being as they were. And now they were in some strange limbo where they didn’t talk to each other. And it was terrible. Crowley needed a friend, so he’d slapped a metaphorical band-aid on his emotional turmoil and driven his Bentley to the bookshop. (The Bentley, on the way over, had contrived a plot to play Queen’s “Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy” the entire way, and it was with great relish that he slammed the door on the way out.)

Now that he was here, in front of the door, it was becoming abundantly clear to Crowley that he did not have a plan. He’d followed that bright thread of Londonish-intuition here, but now it had gone dim, as if waiting for his input. Usually, this wouldn’t fuss him; he was an expert at bullshitting his way out of tough spots. He’d caused some of his worst mischief in history by just nodding along at the right moments.

_ It was late in 1896 when Crowley had stumbled into the bar in Vienna, already drunk. It had been a particularly bad day for him- his favorite new invention of the humans’, the automobile, had just had its first fatal accident. A woman by the name of Bridget Driscoll had been killed on the grounds of the Crystal Palace by an Anglo-French Motor Carriage going at the “reckless pace” 7.2 kilometers an hour. He had gotten drunk early in the day, and had now retreated to his least favorite bar in the city in search of more items of misery. He had found what he wanted- an inebriated and philosophical man by the name of Sigmund Freud.  _

_ But while nursing a bottle or three of absolutely terrible beer, Crowley discovered, to his delight, that the man proved to be both extremely enthusiastic and very incorrect. These were two qualities Crowley liked in a person, and he straightaway supplied the man with more beer and an ear. The mischievous grin on his face had not made an appearance in weeks, but now returned in full force, accompanied by ‘how interesting, I can’t imagine you’d be wrong’ and a few ‘yeah sounds about right’s at several crucial moments. _

_ Several hours later, feeling rather proud of himself, Crowley left the bar and slept off the accompanying hangover for an impressive six days. When he awoke, feeling refreshed but distinctly stiff, he’d miracled himself back to his London flat as a treat. _

_ After cursing his plants back into a particularly verdant regret, Crowley took a turn around his street. A pamphlet was lying on the sidewalk, and Crowley snatched it up, for on the cover, the words “ _ New in Psychology: The Psychoanalytic Theories of Sigmund Freud”  _ were emblazoned. He flicked through it quickly, dread and glee fighting for dominance in his chest. The dread won out as the phrase: “ _ _ Oedipus complex” jumped out at him from the page.  _

_ Crowley shoved the pamphlet in his pocket, for his good mood had vanished at the next few words: “...the child’s unconscious sexual desire for the parent.” Next time he was in the company of an inebriated and aspiring philosopher, Crowley vowed, he would be sure to pay extremely close attention to nuance. Even  _ Hell _ didn’t deserve Freudian psychology _ .

Here, hands shoved in his pockets in front of Aziraphale’s door, all those instincts which usually served him in times of distress were fleeing. Perhaps it was because this situation required his feelings, a subject which Crowley kept under strict lock-and-key, even to himself. Especially today. He couldn’t risk his (admittedly hasty) feelings-band-aid coming undone.

There had been a time, so long ago in Crowley’s memory that the images were faded and warped, in which Crowley had been honest with himself about his feelings. But  _ that _ had ended in a pool of boiling sulfur, and he wasn’t keen on repeating the experience. 

To stall a moment further, Crowley raked his gaze over the door, taking in the unfaded red paint. He smirked, recalling a dusty and dreadfully dull meeting of Parliament in which the discussion of leaded paint and its unfortunate effects ended early and without resolution due to a “snafu involving a large escaped snake of unknown origin.” 

The gold handles just looked so  _ nice _ with this sort of old fashioned red paint, though he would never say it out loud. 

Squinting, he bent to read the hours on the yellowed piece of paper stuck to the window. “‘...except on Tuesdays…’ Aziraphale, you-” he broke off, sighing, and straightened up. Giving the golden door handle an halfhearted tug, Crowley found it, as he expected, locked. 

Undeterred, he knocked twice and stepped back, shifting his weight quickly to one foot so as to feign nonchalance. When no angels came to reproachfully unlock the door, Crowley stepped forward and knocked once more.

He waited. 

When it became clear that Aziraphale “wasn’t in” to open the shop (as the sign so unhelpfully proclaimed,) a strong and unnecessary dose of anxiety doused Crowley’s heart. Perhaps he  _ was _ in and just didn’t want to talk to Crowley. He and his multitude of accumulated braincells hadn’t thought  _ that  _ one out, clearly. He’d been so intent on his idea, on that burst of courage and intuition that he hadn’t even considered what Aziraphale’s feelings on the matter might be.

The feeling was so achingly familiar, and yet each time he experienced it, it was mutated so he could experience fresh pain. Crowley could  _ feel _ his chest constricting, feel the world slowing around him; the noise of passersby dulling to a murmur. 

With a monumental effort, he got his feelings under control and faced the door once more. A few years ago, this would have- this  _ had- _ turned him away. But not today. Today, he had been led here, had followed his twisting, insubstantial gut, and he was damned if he was going to back away now.

Well. Maybe not damned. Perhaps saved? Crowley didn’t know what demons were supposed to swear to, really. After all, hating all that was good didn’t seem that productive, and-

“Well, do stop dithering on the doorstep and come in, Crowley.” said a voice.

Crowley’s eyes flew to the figure standing at the door.

His spectacles were low on his nose, and he had forgone his usual waistcoat in favor of a creamy cable-knit sweater, but there Aziraphale stood, unchanged and unperturbed- his aura of safety just as calming as the day they’d last spoken.

The anxiety which had encircled Crowley’s heart was slowly unwinding itself, leaving him room to breathe. Momentarily undone, all he could do was stare.

After another moment, Crowley swallowed. “I, uh. Thanks.” 

Aziraphale stepped back and Crowley stepped past him into the bookshop. 

The bookshop’s air was an easy scent, dear to Crowley in all the ways it shouldn’t have been. It was all old paper and glue mingled with the slight bite of candle smoke and the tang of miracles. It was the most comforting scent Crowely knew, apart from perhaps Aziraphale himself. (Aziraphale smelled of a cologne Crowley was sure hadn’t been manufactured since the 1880’s, but Aziraphale had never seemed to run out of. It reminded him faintly of caramelized sugar.)

Gentle yellow light suffused through the bookshop’s old casement windows gave the whole place an air of  _ home _ . This made Crowley feel like a prickly old cactus; out of time and place, and yet still clinging to the barest of comforts available. 

Anger, cranky and stiff, warmed his blood. At any slight inconvenience, Crowley could be sure to find this particular monster simmering in his veins, biding its time until it could rise to the surface and become a second, deadlier skin.

There had been a time, so long ago in Crowley’s memory that the images were faded and warped, in which Crowley had been able to keep his early fiery anger in check with the brighter fire of creation, but those were days long gone by, and it was no use wishing for the past to be different. Even a demon couldn’t change the past- he would know, after all; he’d tried. So he let this monster live inside him, let it brew its stinking hatred in his chest. Some days, the heat was all that kept him from becoming grey, grey, grey, like everything else in the entire world. 

But the monster required payment, a sacrifice for its stay, as if it were putting on a show. 

From behind him, Crowley heard the door shut. The floor creaked where Aziraphale stood, on the third floorboard from the door. 

This simple noise galvanized the tempest already brewing in his chest. Voices hissed inside his head.  _ How dare Aziraphale stand there, not saying anything. How dare he ignore you? After all this time?  _ The monster devoured every word- or perhaps it was the one speaking them- and a rage, thorough and complete, engulfed Crowley. He could only close his eyes and clench his fists, and wait for it to pass. It was never worth it to resist; it only wanted to destroy him, in the end. And after all, anger was the key to surviving Hell. Stay incendiary, and the fires couldn’t burn you half so well. 

There was no noise from behind him to indicate it, but Crowley knew Aziraphale could tell he was angry. Crowley also knew that he was being unfair. Hadn’t Aziraphale offered a future? He had never given a  _ no _ . Only a  _ wait _ . A boundary to be respected.

Shame washed over him, cold as a deluge. It was not Aziraphale he could be angry at. Crowley would respect his boundaries forever. If he hoped that Aziraphale would have a quickened pace, a desire for  _ something more,  _ well- that was for the long hours spent alone in his flat, those hours when he let his heart run its course. And for the days spent with a certain prolific piano player, lounging on settees and playing at being human for long enough to pretend he knew what it felt like to fall in love like they did.

And just like that, his temper was gone, washed away in the onslaught of affection he felt for Aziraphale. There was nothing he wouldn’t give to spend a few more hours in Aziraphale’s company, a few more moments of laughter and bickering.

He stood and let the old bookshop wash over him like a fine balm.

A sufficiently awkward silence ensued, in which Crowley observed the myriad of books, which he knew to be completely unchanged.

The separation of nine years hadn’t changed much of them, either, it seemed, except to make them unable to look the other straight in the face.    


From behind him, Aziraphale began, “Crowley, I-”

“No.” Crowley stared resolutely at the bookcases.  _ The Left Hand of Darkness  _ by Ursula K. Le Guin peeked out at him from behind pristine copies of  _ 1984  _ and  _ The Fellowship of the Ring. _

“What? I hadn’t even-”

“No. It’s-” Crowley turned around.

Aziraphale stood a few paces behind him, wringing his hands, heels together; the very picture of poise. Consternation was spread over his pretty face.

Crowley blinked a few times and cleared his throat with difficulty. “You don’t need to apologise. I’m sorry. I should have said that years ago, but... I didn’t. So… Would you come to dinner? With me, I mean?” 

Aziraphale’s mouth opened and closed once again.

“Please?” Crowley added, arms spread wide, mouth quirked.

A tiny smile twisted Aziraphale’s lips. After a moment in which his eyes glittered-

“I’ll get my coat.” 

He left Crowley alone between the books, slipping between some shelves that Crowley was  _ pretty sure _ had never led to the back room. But then again, the rows were probably charmed into leading wherever Aziraphale meant them to. Crowley knew what  _ that  _ was like, at least.

On the round table nearest him, a slim and rather battered spine stuck out from a stack of sheet music, catching his eye. He slid it out. 

“ _ An Official Biography plus Their Recent U.S Royal Tour  _ by Larry Price…” Crowley mumbled under his breath, squinting at the cover.

A colourful picture of Freddie Mercury stared up at him from the cover. At that moment, Aziraphale reappeared, tugging on his coat.

“Aziraphale, what’s this?” Crowley asked, momentarily forgetting their recent feud in his surprise.

“Oh, what? Oh yes, didn’t I tell you? That nice lad Freddie Mercury came by the shop a few months ago, said he thought I ought to have a copy. Nice man. Better taste in sunglasses than you though, I’m afraid to say, my dear.” 

And with a wry smile, Aziraphale walked out the door. Crowley stared after him, his mouth slightly agape. A memory twitched at the edge of his mind.

_ A hazy July evening pressing into the windows of a lavish sitting room, Crowley’s lanky limbs all spread out on a settee, a wine bottle in danger of falling out of his hand. _

It couldn’t be. He wouldn’t have-

When Crowley had closed his mouth, tossed the book on the table with an  _ I’ll-deal-with-you-later  _ glare and hurried out after Aziraphale, he found the angel standing beside the Bentley, holding one of his hands reverently over the paint.

“Are you messing with my car?” he asked, a smile forcing its way into his voice.

Aziraphale snatched his hand away as though he’d been caught writing a rude word. “No.”

Smirking, Crowley offered his arm. “You fancy a walk?” 

“That might be nice, considering it’s such a clear evening. The heat hasn’t let up in days, it’s been just _ridiculous,_ ” said Aziraphale, his voice pitching up on the last words. Gratefully, he slipped his arm into Crowley’s.  
“ _Satan_ , it’s been terrible,” Crowley agreed, as they began walking, “It’s like Golgotha all over again.” 

Aziraphale chuckled, but as they walked down the street, the silence grew in tension once more. Aziraphale had fallen right back into his space in their easy banter, and it spooked Crowley. How easy would it be for them to go right back to how they had been, no questions asked, as if a decade hadn’t passed between them? Did a decade really matter?

It was funny, Crowley thought, as they walked, how a decade seemed so long, now. There had been a time when they could have gone a hundred years without seeing one another, and yet here they were, falling into awkward silence after only ten. Disgraceful. Although, Crowley was  _ good _ at disgraceful, so why did this feel far less than satisfactory? He felt profoundly uncomfortable with this new development. The thought prickled uncomfortably in his mind, like the beginnings of sweat on a cold afternoon. 

“So, been to any concerts of interest lately?” Aziraphale asked on an exhale, pulling Crowley back to earth. 

“Nothing you would like,” Crowley said automatically, tossing his hair back. He’d let it get rather long in Aziraphale’s absence, and the lack of a tie around his wrist was beginning to get to him. “Although…” he said, as the thought occured to him, “you did say you’d met Freddie Mercury?”

Aziraphale, brightening at once and evidently grateful for the topic to latch on to, launched into an impassioned speech. “Yes! And the other boys came in too- the drummer was really rather sweet, and- what was his name- Brian, I think, and I had a  _ lovely _ conversation about astrophysics. The things humans get up to these days- it’s really incredible. It feels like just yesterday we were having to convince all those seventeenth century priests not to burn all those poor people for calling out the church about all that nonsense with the  _ crystal spheres _ and the  _ geocentric _ universe.  _ Honestly _ , the things they thought would sell. Although,” and here Aziraphale shot him a humorous glance, “as I remember, your tactic wasn’t too convincing either- saying you  _ made the stars _ clearly was never going to work.” 

He smirked before continuing, almost wistfully, “It is impressive, though. I wish I could have seen it.” He looked up at the darkening sky, as if trying to see the stars through the haze of late sunset.

Crowley made a movement with his head like he meant to flick a fly away. “Oh, it wasn’t- I mean, uh, it, um.” 

“Oh, come now. It must have been  _ something. _ ”

It had been rather exquisite, all things considered, but Crowley wasn’t about to say _that_. Not in the middle of a crowded sidewalk on the way to dinner with no alcohol in his veins and every chance Aziraphale would make _the face_ at him. Crowley could pretend to resist many things about Aziraphale, but _the face_ wasn’t one of them. Something about the eyebrows- knitted together and a slightly disbelieving look gracing his old features, like something about Crowley was surprising, interesting, and worth knowing, still, after all these years. He looked away to hide the heat which had risen to his cheeks.

“Are you quite alright, dear?” Aziraphale asked tentatively.

Crowley made a long, drawn out vowel sound, before changing tack and asking, “We’re near the park, right? Why don’t I-” he hesitated, and then- “I could miracle up that quiche we had in the 30’s and some wine and… those macarons?” 

Aziraphale’s face lit up in the setting sun, and the doubt inside Crowley broke to embers. “Oh, dear, how wonderful. And we can see if the haze clears enough to see the stars.”

And with that, Aziraphale tugged Crowley along to St. James’ park.

~

They were tucked into a wide bench, ) most of the wine and macarons devoured, when Aziraphale asked, “why do you think they called it Queen?”

Crowley furrowed his brows, missing his mouth slightly with the wine glass for his trouble. “Dunno, angel. Why didn’t they call it Freddie and His Merry Band of Courtiers? Missed opportunity, if you ask me.” 

Aziraphale giggled, and the sound made Crowley have to work to hold back a ridiculously joyous smile. “Have you ever met them?”

“Uh.” Crowley felt heat rise to his cheeks again, and he was glad for the darkness. The  _ memory _ returned to him once again.

_ A hazy July day, Freddie and Crowley stretched out on couches in a ridiculously lavish living room, talking for hours. _

“Yeah. I did.

“And?” Aziraphale prompted. “When was it?”

“ Few years back.” He turned to level a suspicious glance at Aziraphale. “ Why?” 

“Oh, no reason. Just… oh, you know, their songs. Quite… imaginative.”

Crowley could think of  _ several  _ responses to this, but as the silence stretched between them, the doubt which had quieted during their evening together raised its fiery head out of the embers and gave a roar. Hadn’t this been exactly what he wasn’t going to do? Ruin things before they truly rekindled?  _ Go too fast? _

Miraculously, it was Aziraphale who tentatively broke the silence. “Well, you could tell me who you met.”

“Freddie. Nice chap.” Crowley said, carefully casual. “And... remind me to tell you the rest in a few decades.”

Aziraphale huffed, and Crowley smiled.  _ He could do slow.  _ It could be his middle name, if he wanted.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Repeat after me: “We do not like Sigmund Freud.” I hope for his sake some of his psychology is salvageable; but the Oedipus complex most certainly is terrible.  
> I am unsure whether alcohol was legal in Vienna in 1896 (seeing the prohibition in other countries was around this time) but for the sake of this story it is. So in other words Crowley doesn’t get his century-long nap but he does spur on Freudian psychology so win win right??
> 
> Historical fun facts I do know about: the year of this chapter is 1976, two years before the use of lead in paint was banned in residential buildings in the US, seventy years after it was banned in Australia, and sixteen years before it was banned in the UK. Technically, however, as of 1992, leaded red paint is still available to use by special licence. Yes I am looking at you Crowley why won’t you let the bookshop not create lead poisoning. For the purpose of this story, Crowley invades a possibly fictional parliament meeting in order to postpone the banning of leaded paint. This is inadvisable.
> 
> Anyway, I hope you enjoyed! Comments and kudos are always appreciated, and you can come talk to me on tumblr. :) Have a lovely day!


	2. So Close To Magic

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title credits: "So Close To Magic" - Aquilo
> 
> For the purpose of this fanfic, many renaissance paintings were gathered together in this chapter! These paintings (The Birth of Venus \- Botticelli, The Game of Chess \- Sofonisba Anguissola, and Primavera \- Botticelli) are real, as are the analyses about them, but as to whether they were gathered together in this fashion in 1982... it's is highly debatable and one of the only historical things that I made up for this fic. (Honestly, it was too much even for me for them to go to Italy for a day.)
> 
> For Aziraphale’s hat, i’m imagining something along the lines of this.
> 
> Thank you to sevdrag for the wine recommendations I would not have known where to begin!! (also I hope I got it right lmao) also for listening to my Writer’s Drama and dread at my several very divergent plot lines.

It was an uncomfortably warm day for May, and the heat had begun early in the morning when Crowley had picked Aziraphale up from the steps of the bookshop, as though the sun had gotten up early for the express purpose of tormenting him. The ride to Lancashire (though miraculously shorter than it should have been) hadn’t been much better. The Bentley, resolutely older than the first car air conditioning systems, insisted for its trouble that the windows be rolled down the entire way, which caused Crowley’s hair to become sentient and Aziraphale to almost have several nervous breakdowns. 

But now they were here, sweltering in the sun of a strawberry field. In Lancashire. For fun. Crowley could deal with hot weather better than most, (in fact, when it came to heat, he was rather the expert) but _this_ was downright barbaric. Most of the other strawberry-pickers were enjoying the break from England’s notoriously grey normality, as evidenced by their smiles and floppy hats, but Crowley just couldn’t bring himself to do it.

It didn’t help that Aziraphale was thoroughly enjoying himself, which meant that he, Crowley, was being a poor sport by lurking in the minimal slivers of shade and grumbling. It had been _his_ idea, after all, so he should be at least attempting some sort of agreeable behavior. Part of his grumbling was because Aziraphale had clearly chosen his outfit with immense care that morning, with great attention to the weather. He had forgone his usual vintage attire for a pair of creamy straight-legged sailor trousers and some sort of flowy linen blouse thing that had been making Crowley lose his train of thought for several hours.

Grousing, Crowley unfolded his arms and pushed off the tree he’d been leaning against for the better part of half an hour. He strode through rows of low strawberry bushes, slinking past families with small children laughing delightedly, and by the time he reached Aziraphale, he was smiling grudgingly.

“Ah! Crowley, there you are! Look at all these magnificent fruits- I wonder if we won’t be able to make a jam of some sort with them? That would be quite lovely, don’t you think?” Aziraphale proffered a wicker basket which did indeed hold quite a number of brilliantly red strawberries.

Crowley sniffed, his tongue darting out from between his lips to test the air before he took the basket. “They smell alright. But what did you do, steal all the good ones from a poor, unsuspecting family?” 

Aziraphale only blushed slightly as he said, “Oh, you know me. I only _persuaded_ them better ones might be elsewhere besides the bush _I_ was looking in. There probably are,” he concluded lightly, before turning to inspect the plants around him. “But look at these! Rather nice, don’t you think?”

“Yeah, angel,” said Crowley, his grip loose on the basket handle as he watched Aziraphale bend to pick a few more. 

With a huffed breath, Aziraphale straightened up and gave Crowley a smile. They were only a foot apart, and Aziraphale, almost as if he didn’t see Crowley, said softly, “Let us continually offer a sacrifice of our praise—the fruit of lips that confess His name.” 

Gooseflesh rippled all over Crowley’s exposed skin (which was, admittedly, not much, despite the hot weather) and he stared back at Aziraphale, lost for words. Then Aziraphale shook himself, glanced at Crowley, flushed, and continued down the row. 

It continued to be an exhaustingly hot day, but when Crowley had returned to his flat, still tasting their disastrous strawberry jelly on his tongue, he concluded that the May of 1977 wasn’t so bad after all.

  
  


June followed May, and so did July, and August, and all the months after that in the orderly procession they had become accustomed to. Only Crowley felt out of the ordinary, and only on the predictably rainy afternoon of the third of March of 1982 did he realize what felt off.

He felt safe. 

For the first time in his many long years as a demon, he felt like Hell couldn’t touch him. This would, probably, return to bite him when he least expected it, but that was something Future Crowley could deal with. 

Present Crowley happened to be standing in the middle of an art museum, having Aziraphale read the little wall plaques aloud as he gazed, starry-eyed, at the paintings. He’d always loved painting, and art, for that matter, and so when Aziraphale had noted that there was to be an exhibit on some rather famous Renaissance art opening in March that year, he’d snatched at the opportunity. Despite his ingenuity and motivation (and a knack for bribing high-ranking art history officials), Crowley had been unable to get even a glimpse of some of his long-favorite pieces of Renaissance art. 

So, Aziraphale had gotten them tickets, and here they were, drinking in reminders of the glory of the Italian Renaissance. Of course, Crowley thought, as he examined at _The Birth of Venus_ by Botticelli, it hadn’t been _all_ great. There hadn’t been a time period in history that didn’t have significant issues. “The Debate About Women,”—an open-ended decades-long debate over whether women were equal to men (they were not) and putting the question away for several hundred years— _had been_ a part of the Renaissance, after all. There was no getting around it, but Crowley had long since realized that one could appreciate genius while righting the mistakes it left behind.

Aziraphale had moved to the next painting, a work done, according to Aziraphale, in 1555 by a Spanish noblewoman by the name of Sofonisba Anguissola. It was a curious piece, all the forefront figures, the woman’s sisters and maid rendered in great detail, while in the background, a white city through which a bright river trailed through faded into the mountains. 

“... and she completed her last portrait when she was over eighty,” Aziraphale concluded, turning back to Crowley. Lowering his voice, he asked, “Do you think you ever met her? You were in Spain around then.”  
“Maybe. Yeah. Could have. All those courtiers and nobles, though.” Crowley gave the painting one last appraising look before moving to the next one, his shoes’ clicks echoing on the smooth stone floor.

Aziraphale followed him, undeterred. “She was quite talented, you know. It’s fortunate for the rest of us that her father allowed her to study painting at all.”

“Yeah, you’re probably right,” Crowley conceded, leaning down to squint at the plaque on the next painting, _Primavera_. “Venus? What does that say?”

Aziraphale’s shoulder pressed into Crowley’s as he stooped to read aloud, “‘Framed by a grove of orange trees, Venus, goddess of love, is flanked on the right by Flora, goddess of flowers and fertility, and on the left by the Three Graces, goddesses of banquets, dance, and social occasions. Above, Venus’s son Cupid, the god of love, shoots darts of desire, while at the far right the wind-god Zephyrus chases the nymph Chloris. The entire scene rests on classical mythology, though some art historians claim that Venus is an allegory for the Virgin Mary. Botticelli captured the ideal for female beauty in the Renaissance: slender, with pale skin, a high forehead, red-blond hair, and sloping shoulders.’” 

Throughout this entire affair, Crowley only half listened, the details of the painting rather lost on him as the majority of his senses became attuned to the place where his shoulder met Aziraphale’s. The touch was warm, even through their coats, and it made Crowley want to lean in farther and press his whole side against Aziraphale, like a snake soaking up a narrow band of sunlight. Then Aziraphale rose and looked quizzically at Crowley.   
“Alright?”

Clearing his throat, Crowley replied in his best attempt at nonchalance, “Peachy, angel.”

Aziraphale offered him a blinding smile, and just like that, Crowley was gone, lost in distinctly undemonic bursts of joy and affection. The rest of the day found them bumping shoulders and leaning in under the pretext of pointing out an interesting brushstroke or a hidden cross in the Northern Renaissance paintings.

Even that section, (a sector of the period Crowley preferred wasn’t as prolific as it was) couldn’t dampen his spirits. The symbolism and allegory of the Fantastically Wonderful Great Plan that usually irked him and reminded him of his demonic nature were lovely illustrations of human imagination and creativity; the solemn portraits simply a passing cloud. 

Crowley felt quite emboldened when they left the museum some time later, en route to a new Italian restaurant Aziraphale had been quite keen to visit. The Bentley, possibly sensing his high spirits, or perhaps just because it had gotten rather reckless in its old age, decided to put on some jaunty tunes for the ride. As it was, Crowley was neck-deep in a _friendly discussion_ about the impact of Roman architecture and values on the later European philosophical climate and failed to notice the first few notes of Queen’s “Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy” as they emerged from the speakers. A few moments later, when he realized Aziraphale had gone silent, Crowley glanced over. Aziraphale sat, hands paused in the air mid-explanation, a curiously wondering expression on his face. His head was cocked to the side, his brows furrowed, as if he were trying to parse out a particularly difficult puzzle in the morning crosswords.

Freddie Mercury’s voice filled the quiet car. _“I can dim the lights and sing you songs full of sad things… we can do the tango just for two… I can serenade and gently play on your heart strings, be your Valentino just for you… Ooh love, ooh lover boy...”_

Crowley scrabbled for the radio dials at the same moment as Aziraphale, and their hands crushed together awkwardly. 

“Uh,” Crowley started, staring at their hands, and at the radio- which had both gotten louder and seemed to be enjoying itself.

Then a horn blared, Aziraphale yanked his hand away and cried “Crowley!” and Crowley swerved to avoid a bright green car which _somehow_ hadn’t had the sense to get out of the way of the Bentley when it had drifted across the road in front of it.

Crowley shot a glare at the radio. It silenced at once, and they spent the rest of the drive in fidgety silence until Aziraphale spotted a funny sign and they slowed down to laugh at it.

“‘Sign Not in Use,’” Aziraphale read, shaking with laughter, “Why on earth would they write that?”

“They wanted to make sure no one would put their own sign on top of it. Now it’s official. It’s Not in Use.” Crowley said, matter-of-factly, putting the car in park.

“Well, I think we should put it to use.”  
“What, you want to steal it?” Crowley asked, amazed.

“No! It wouldn’t fit in the car! We should write on it!” Aziraphale said, his eyes twinkling with mischief.

So Crowley produced a sharpie from the depths of the Bentley and they ambled out of the car to stand in the grass by the sign, hemming and hawing about their message.

“We should say ‘yet.’” Crowley insisted, capping and uncapping the sharpie. “Put ‘yet’ at the end. ‘S funny.”

“Oh, fine, but I still say we should have added ‘by occult beings’ below it.” Aziraphale said as Crowley squeaked ‘yet’ into the bright paint.

“That’s too long. Got to be short to be funny.” Crowley said, standing back and putting the cap on his pen. He turned towards the car, clipping Aziraphale over the head with the Sharpie. “Like you!” 

Future Crowley hadn’t yet, as (now Past) Crowley had anticipated, been bitten in the ass by his decision to circle around Aziraphale in the manner of a cat. He had, however, become so accustomed to dropping by the bookshop every week, that it caught him by surprise to find himself, at nine on Sunday the twenty-fifth of June, 1988, leaning on the edge of the same bookshelf he had found himself at the previous day. As Aziraphale rounded the corner out of his back room, smoothing his hands down his corduroy pants, eyes on the door, he found Crowley in a rather similar state of surprise to his own.

“Crowley! What are you doing here?” he asked, a hint of amusement creeping into his voice. 

Recovering himself, Crowley replied, “Taking you to the seaside.” All casual indifference. As if there were no righter way to spend a Sunday at the end of June. He held out the towels under his arm as proof. “Look,” he said, “I’ve got towels.”

“Well,” Aziraphale said, his face sliding into one of studied contemplation, as though truly unsure how to proceed. “I _was_ planning on reshelving the Romantic poets today…” here he cast a sidelong and reproachful glance at a shelf out of Crowley’s vision, “but I suppose a few rebellious poets can wait, can’t they?” He grinned conspiratorially, and it was all Crowley could do to keep his countenance. 

“I’m sure they can, angel,” Crowley said, and, tipping his hat to a jaunty angle, he turned towards the door. “Meet me outside when you’re ready.”

Not ten minutes passed before Aziraphale appeared, rosy-cheeked and slightly out of breath, carrying a large basket and wearing an antique white sundress and a ridiculously large white hat. 

“What _is_ that?” Crowley asked, disdain clear in his voice as Aziraphale settled himself into the car. “It looks like a cake,” he added blankly, as it came into full view when Aziraphale pulled it off his head to rest in his lap.

Aziraphale shot him an annoyed look. “It’s a _hat_ , Crowley. And before I hear any funny remarks, I can recall with perfect clarity a _monstrosity_ you once wore on the steps of the Pitti Palace in Florence,” Aziraphale shot him a glance, and when Crowley remained grumpily silent, and he continued, satisfied. “So I expect I will hear no slander against my hat.”

There was no more slander spoken aloud to the hat, which did happen to be a rather ridiculous confection- faux feathers and pearls, netting and ribbon; the whole nine yards of early twentieth century high fashion- but Crowley did send it so many a murderous glare that he was surprised the whole thing didn’t erupt into elegant, holy flames.

They reached the beach without further incident, however, and they trudged out onto the sand, Aziraphale practically skipping and pointing out every little flower and bit of grass they passed along the way, holding his hat on with one gloved hand and his skirt out of the sand with the other. He was being absolutely no help with the luggage, though Crowley found little reason to point this out, as he was so delighted. 

Towels and baskets and (to Crowley’s annoyance and confusion) several books arranged neatly on a high-ish spot away from the waves, they finally turned to survey the water. It was quite a beautiful day, and though the sun had not yet even reached its peak, the water it shone on winked and sparkled merrily. Several families, complete with tiny children waded and shrieked farther down the beach to their right, and to the left lay an almost uninterrupted stretch of sand, marram grass shifting gently in the breeze.

Crowley closed his eyes and heaved a great breath, letting it out slowly, savoring the smell of brine and sand baking in the sun. When he opened his eyes, he found Aziraphale gazing at him with a soft look on his face, eyes crinkled and lips pressed together in a soft smile.

“What,” Crowley snapped grumpily, trying to avoid looking at the straps of Aziraphale’s dress. (They were wide, and looked to be soft where they widened at the bodice, which was sheer and light, with a slip underneath. Great job _he_ was doing at not looking.) He made an attempt at a sneer and turned to fiddle with the umbrella. 

When he felt his cheeks had cooled, he turned back, finding Aziraphale settled down with one of his Romantic poets, after all. He voiced a groan, throwing back his head and drawing it out until he heard the book snap shut in annoyance.

“We’re at the beach!” Crowley exclaimed. “You can read everywhere else! Let’s go swimming!” 

Aziraphale paid the water a worried glance. “I’m- I’m not sure. You go along, though. Great fun, swimming.”

“Not- Oh, come on. You’ve got to get in some time.” He’d been about to say _Not without you_ , which was entirely too fast and also much too fond. He lifted his arms above his head and, shaking his head, lifted his shirt off. “It’s now or never, angel,” he said, and with a wicked glance back at Aziraphale, he took off running towards the water.

He heard a shout, but the wind was rushing past his ears, and the water was crashing in at his feet, and all of a sudden _he_ was crashing into the waves, salt water rushing to fill the space in his throat a muffled yell had left.

He rose, flipping his dripping hair out of his face and turning to see Aziraphale, grinning at him, and _soaking_ _wet_ from head to toe. 

“You pushed me? Oh, you _bastard!_ ” Crowley laughed, a smile spreading over his face. 

Aziraphale shook water from his ears. “I would have been quite a poor sport if I had let you win like that. Besides, now it’s easier to do _this!_ ” He lunged at Crowley, who staggered backwards, right into an oncoming wave. 

When he stood, spluttering and unable to see for the salt stinging his eyes, he pointed to where he thought he’d last seen Aziraphale and yelled “It’s not over yet!”

A bubbling laugh from behind him forced his eyes open and he spun and lost his balance, a gasp escaping him. A strong hand shot out to catch his arm, and for a moment everything in Crowley was _fingers on wrist and sliding over palm_ and suddenly his face was inches from Aziraphale’s. The water shushed around their ankles, and retreating sand kissed at their toes.

“Don’t go falling again, Crowley,” Aziraphale whispered. “I couldn’t catch you the first time.”

Crowley erupted in shivers, and he could feel each drop of water that sought a trail down his skin. And then, just as quickly as it had begun, the moment passed, and Aziraphale stepped back, a smirk on his face.

“Think you can top _that_ , foul fiend?”

Crowley grinned.

Several sandy and very splashy hours later, the pair retreated to the shade of their umbrella to relax and open a miraculously chilled bottle of wine. It was possible, Crowley thought, as he took a sip of wine (a buttery, oak-aged Chardonnay) and popped some almonds in his mouth, that happiness existed in its purest form when you weren’t looking for it. He’d been optimistic this morning, sure, but it was nothing to what he felt now. He felt as though he’d just run for miles and could (and furthermore _would_ ) do it again if Aziraphale so much as smiled at him. 

He glanced over at Aziraphale then, and Aziraphale, who was busy spreading goat cheese on a cracker, didn’t look up. Crowley watched him place the cracker on his tongue and then look out towards the sea, an expression of pure calm on his face. This melted into one of pure joy as he appreciated the cracker, and Crowley looked away, feeling as though he’d been caught watching something indecent.

When he’d composed himself, Crowley reflected on the last few years. The beach was starting to fill up now, couples and families wandering down to the sand to take an early supper. It struck him, suddenly, when he looked at all of them, to wonder how they looked at _them._ At him and Aziraphale. How would they appear? Were they those eccentric oddballs just up the beach? Were they that old couple drinking wine and reading poetry aloud for amusement? It had been a long time since Crowley had wondered what humans thought of him. Even longer since he’d cared. But he found that he _did_ care about this, and rather deeply too. He let out a breath. 

_Don’t go pushing your luck, Crowley_ , he thought. _Just wait. Surely even_ you _can do that._

And Crowley was waiting. He was taking it slow. And it was nice. He just wished that sometimes _waiting_ didn’t feel so much like a synonym for _purposeless._

He watched a young woman dart down to the edge of the water, laughing as it licked at her long skirt. Her companion watched from a safer distance, smiling genially, one hand pressed to her skirt to keep it from whipping up in the breeze. When the first girl returned, she offered her arm to her partner, and the two meandered down the beach, arm in arm.

Crowley felt a lump in his throat. He never could get over how short a time human youth lasted. Other couples and lone figures had accumulated near them on the sand, and Crowley watched each of them with unusual fondness. They really were an okay bunch, humans, when you got right down to it.

And, brilliantly, beyond them all, lay the sea. Crowley sometimes felt that whatever anguish the _Great Plan_ had caused could be forgiven in the presence of the sea. It was so immovable, so forcibly _present_ , that Crowley (who liked to imagine he was quite the presence himself) felt positively minuscule.

By the time the sun set, and they’d exhausted their wine and food, Crowley was as relaxed as he’d ever been. He and Aziraphale traded lazy, full smiles, each one making Crowley’s heart flutter. As they had laid on their towels, admiring the last of the glorious summer sunset, their hands had inched closer together. Crowley pretended not to notice this, and instead trailed his right hand casually in the sand between their towels, palm up. After a moment, Aziraphale stretched out a hand to meet it. Their fingers met, paused, and, as if of their own accord, curled together gently. 

Aziraphale sat hunched over, one knee beneath his chin, staring out over the water, a tiny smile on his lips. Crowley looked down at their hands. Thought about the way Aziraphale had reached out. How his fingers had instinctively curled about Aziraphale’s. About Aziraphale’s tiny smile.

He turned his gaze back to the water and tightened his fingers almost imperceptibly; an open-ended question. 

The last glowing dregs of the sun were melting below the horizon. Crowley’s heart was a hopeful bird, even after all this time in darkness.

Aziraphale squeezed back.

A warm, new feeling was steadily filling Crowley’s chest and curling around his spine.

 _Happy,_ it insisted. _ _Happy, happy, happy.__

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading! Comments and kudos are v much appreciated, or come bug me on tumblr  
> Have a good day and drink some water~


	3. The Way The World Works

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title credits: "The Story" - Conan Grey
> 
> This is the saddest chapter, folks. It's got a nice ending, though, so I hope it's not too bad.

A dreary, rainy day in late November of 1991 found Crowley lying on the floor in the middle of the hallway he used for his plants. They’d been getting quite cocky recently, full of themselves for reasons Crowley could find no evidence for, and he’d taken to sleeping in the middle of them so they wouldn’t slack off in the middle of the night. He was also avoiding his feelings. Avoiding his feelings came in the form of avoiding telephones and letterboxes in the hopes that he wouldn’t have to resist any attempts at communication with Aziraphale. 

So here he was, on a rainy day in late November, being unusually stubborn. Not talking to anyone. And lying in the middle of his plants. Every few minutes, a wave of anxiety would crash over him, a voice hissing in his brain and saying _not good enough_ and _demon demon demon_ over and over and over and and he would have to close his eyes, breathe deeply, and order himself to calm down.   
If he was honest with himself, it probably wasn’t the best time to be alone. And things with Aziraphale had been going really _well_ , so he really had no reason to worry. But since he was a demon, (or perhaps just since he was Crowley,) he wasn’t about to ruin their little bubble of happiness by running to Aziraphale’s door like a drenched cat crying pitifully for shelter from the rain every time he had a problem.

At this last thought, a feeling that had nothing to do with his anxiety and everything to do with his annoyingly accurate intuition told him it was time for an intervention.

Heaving himself up off the floor and directing a particularly ruthless glare at several disrespectful drooping leaves, Crowley drifted into the kitchen to find solace in a cup of tea. By the time he’d made one and sat down at his lone barstool to stare at moodily into its depths, he’d decided to call Aziraphale. He was staring at the phone and getting past worrying about the probable pathetic exterior this decision would present when it rang.

He blinked. It rang again.

Grumbling, Crowley slid off the stool and went to answer it. “Hello?”

As if he’d been summoned, Aziraphale’s voice poured forth from the receivers. “Crowley! Good. You haven’t been answering my calls, I thought maybe… well, anyway, I need to tell you something. You… you might want to sit down.”

Crowley furrowed his eyebrows and remained standing. “What’s- what do you mean?” Aziraphale’s voice had turned gentle, and it had reignited the anxiety in his chest in full force.

After a few moments in which Aziraphale seemed to be considering his words, he said: “Freddie Mercury passed away this morning. I thought… I thought you might not have seen it, you know, because you’ve been… well.” The sound of a slow exhale crackled over the line. “I thought it unlikely you’d want to hear it from some callous news source, so… I called.” He said all of this very carefully, as if it were likely Crowley would become unrestrained upon hearing all the information and required a gentle touch to remain in control of his limbs.

As it was, Crowley went completely still. Not a muscle twitched to indicate he’d heard Aziraphale’s words. He stood, receiver pressed to his ear, gazing out the window at the rooftops of the buildings opposite his flat. 

There was silence, and then, softly,

“Crowley, dear, would you- would you come round? I can fix some tea… or some coffee- I have that kind you always buy from that shop by the Royal Observatory.” he pressed gently.

“Yeah, sure.” Crowley said thickly. “Yeah, okay.”

  
  


He arrived at the front steps of the bookshop, and though he had no memory of doing so, had evidently walked through the rain to get there. He knocked on the big red door, averting his eyes as it swung open to reveal Aziraphale standing in the doorway.

Dimly, he recalled a time, a little over fifteen years previously, when he’d stood upon the same steps as he did now, nerves pacing their dreadful circle around his heart. Now, all he felt was a dreadful, searing emptiness threatening to rip a wider tear inside his chest.

He closed his eyes.

When Crowley was finally able to blink his eyes blearily and take in his surroundings, the first thing he saw was a copy of  _ The Silmarilian  _ perched on an antique table near his eye-level. A further inspection proved he was tucked into an armchair in Aziraphale’s cozy back room. Even in his stupor, he registered that there were quite a lot of  _ things _ here. Books were scattered about, some laying open, silky bookmarks tucked between their pages trailing down to the ancient carpet at his feet. His feet were, as Crowley discovered, covered in a thick, woolen blanket that probably should have been scratchy but instead was rather soft. Its soothing weight extended all the way up to his chin, and for once, Crowley didn’t resist the comfort it provided.

A noise prompted him to whip his head toward the door, but it was only Aziraphale, carrying a mug of coffee.

He set it down on the glass table between them, and sat down in the neighboring chair.

Crowley looked down at where his hands lay folded beneath the blanket. After a minute, he found his voice, and managed a scratchy thanks.

“It’s quite alright.” Aziraphale replied, quietly. There was a moment more of silence, and then he continued. “You knew him, didn’t you?”

Crowley shouldn’t have. The correct answer was  _ no, I don’t get involved with humans, because it’s always like this. They go and leave a great gaping hole in your chest and there’s nothing anyone can do about it. _ and the truthful answer was a terrible, resounding,  _ yes. _ He’d let himself get  _ involved _ . He  _ never  _ got involved. It had been a stupid idea when he began it, and it had continued on being a stupid idea for as long as Crowley had entertained it. And now it had gone and bitten him in the ass, right where he deserved it.

The stupidity didn’t negate the pain, though. 

_ A hazy July evening pressed in at the windows of the lavish London townhouse in which Anthony J. Crowley and Freddie Mercury were indulging in two of the best deadly sins: gluttony and sloth. This involved passing a bottle of Château Lafite-Rothschild back and forth until they were sufficiently drunk enough to lie back on couches and trace patterns in the air with lazy fingers, speaking only when a vague thought about nothing crossed their minds.  _

_ Overall, the evening had been going, in Crowley’s esteemed opinion, quite well. He was doing a good job of Not Thinking, something he tended to struggle with when his brain was sober. He’d sought out companionship after several nights of drinking alone- which was not at all as tragically glamorous as Crowley thought it ought to be. After all, he was  _ sad _. And sadness clamoured for indulgence, especially in the form of a lovesick demon sprawled over the arms of an ornate golden throne. But it had altogether reeked of loneliness to Crowley after a few nights, so here he was, in this… sitting room? of Freddie Mercury’s, getting absolutely pissed.  _

_ From the depths of a nearby sofa, a voice, slightly raised, said, “Darling, I asked you a question.” _

_ “Oh, what? Sorry.” Crowley scrubbed a weary hand over his eyes. _

_ “I  _ said _ , so who’s the one who’s got you all… drawn out and hungover like this? I take it they’re a real one- I thought I was the king of wretched pining, but I think you can have the… the apple. No, the crown. Apple? Kings, and such, you know. _

_ Kings and such indeed. Apple aside, Crowley was pretty sure his traitorous heart had devised the original Wretched Pining Scheme, but even as drunk as he was, he remembered he had to play at being human. He produced a series of disjointed vowels before his sluggish brain concocted a response. “A real one. Yeah. You could say that.” _

_ “Could I?” _

_ “Sure, if you knew him.” _

_ There was a beat, and then- “Do I?” _

_ Crowley huffed out a laugh on an exhale. “You… He don’t- doesn’t… Not the same circles.” Crowley blinked, shaking his head so his next words were more coherent. “He has a bookshop. In SoHo” _

_ “How utterly charming,” Freddie said, a note in his voice betraying an eagerness Crowley couldn’t place. There were dusty shifting noises from the direction of his couch. _

_ “Yeah. He is.” Crowley wasn’t sure how they had arrived at this conversation. The shifting noises continued, and Crowley looked over to see Freddie laying on his side, his face illuminated in the dusty glow of the red table lamp.  _

_ “So what’s he like, this man of yours?” _

_ Crowley considered. Was this fair? Surely the yearning in his tone would be too much. But what was there to tell? A little less than two thousand years of affectionate rows and some sentimental tokens from a one-sided affair with an angel. And besides, it was only  _ now _ when he even thought about his longing at all. He supposed that was what came of bottling all his feelings into a tight little ball of thin, silky yarn just underneath his right ribcage. Maybe it would do him good to let off some steam without causing too much havoc. _

_ “Well, he’s… old fashioned. Likes his books and his wine and his music all from sixty years ago.” _

_ Freddie sighed. “They called those the glory days, didn’t they?” _

_ Crowley didn’t comment that he thought they’d been only  _ okay _ as far as days went, but instead laid back, resting his head on an overly stuffed arm pillow that matched the couch’s fantastically hideous stripes of magenta. He closed his eyes. “Sometimes, late at night, after I drive him home from- oh, some restaurant, and I walk him to the door, he invites me inside. We’ll listen to his stupid, ancient records and he’ll get this look in his eye, like I-” Crowley paused, and the silence hung thick in the air over his parted lips. “Like I hung the stars,” he whispered.  _

_ “We’ll stand so close together, and I’m dying to ask him to dance, to put his hand in mine like all those books he knows by heart. It’d be- it’d be like a great, dying fall, wouldn’t it?” Crowley’s voice was raw. He wasn’t sure where the words had come from, but he could feel their metallic tang on his tongue, their honesty searing his throat on the way out. _

_ “Well, Crowley. He sounds like... quite the man. I fear to ask it- but what went wrong?” _

_ A tear welled in each of Crowley’s eyes, and he let them slide silently down the slopes of his cheek and nose to cling, trembling, to his chin. “Oh,” he said, gallantly, “he said I go too fast for him.”  _

_ Even as he spoke it he knew it was foolish. It wasn’t even a refusal of any unspoken proposals, but a stinging reminder that Crowley was unworthy to play at these human games. He wasn’t made to love like they did, so it hurt in the cruelest of ways; he was hasty when love needed patience, coarse when love required civility, and yet he’d gone on loving with the whole of his existence anyway. _

_ “I’ve heard you do drive like the fires of Hell are at your heels,” Freddie said, the hint of humor in his voice a balm for Crowley’s wounds, “but he’s a right bastard for making you wait.” _

_ This time, he knew the words were true before they left his lips. “He’s worth waiting for.”  _

_ “Sounds like you both should be quite happy- but don’t wait too long, darling. Don’t let life catch up with him before you’ve said your piece. But tell me,” he added, sitting up, “does he talk all fancy to you? Write letters? Make your heart beat faster with every word?” _

_ “God, he says the  _ weirdest _ things sometimes. And I swear he gets his romance from Jane Austen novels, but…”  _

_ “You love him.” _

_ And there it was. Crowley’s ultimate sin, floating there in the heady air of a late July evening.  _

_ It sounded so simple from a stranger’s lips, the words falling so easily from a human mouth. Was it easier for them? They had such a short time to drink and love and  _ live _ \- did it make it easier to have a deadline? _

_ Crowley’s next words were a quiet, ragged agreement. “I love him.” _

_ He always had, really. It wasn’t as though this- speaking the words aloud- had changed anything. But hearing his searing confession,  _ sharing it _ with someone, sharing it with someone he trusted, no less, made it feel final. _

_ Crowley didn’t like finality; he liked things to go on, and on, indefinitely, and with no tricky endings like in all those stupid mystery novels Aziraphale stocked in the bookshop. He didn’t like endings, and yet, this sort of felt like one. An ending to the secrecy. Maybe, Crowley thought, as he drifted off to sleep on Freddie Mercury’s ridiculously maroon couch, maybe it doesn’t  _ have _ to be a fall.  _

  
  


It hadn’t happened many times. There was only so often in those lonely nine years without Aziraphale that Crowley felt the need to drink with someone other than his thoughts for company. It hadn’t happened many times, but when you didn’t have a lot of friends to begin with, company was like, well, an apple in a garden.

Irresistible.

He was so terrible at resisting. 

And now he was here, in Aziraphale’s back room, clutching a mug of coffee he didn’t remember picking up and mourning the loss of a human he shouldn’t have known. Why had he sought him out to begin with? It wasn’t like there weren’t normal people in normal bars with normal lives Crowley could have a drink with. But he’d learned  _ that  _ lesson in 1896, thirty years after the holy water fiasco. He could have laughed; it had only taken him nine years the second time, nine years to seek out company outside of Aziraphale after an argument. Which wasn’t really fair, Crowley reprimanded himself. It hadn’t been an argument. Only a request for patience. So he’d been patient, and entertained the hope that one day, Aziraphale would be ready. That he’d- that they’d  _ both _ \- have the courage to try their hand at being  _ something more _ .

And they had.

And so why was this so hard? The depth of the sadness he was feeling washed over him, finally. It was terrible, easier to bear than numb shock. 

With an effort, he found he could move his hands and lift the mug he held to his mouth. He sipped, and it was as though a calm breeze licked through his mind, quieting all other thought. 

_ A light wind had sprung up around the newly-opened Royal Observatory on the evening of August the tenth, whipping Crowley’s hair into his face as he stood, arms crossed, waiting for Aziraphale to return from his errand. A moment later, he emerged from the crowd, a cup of coffee clutched in either hand.  _

_ He smiled as he handed Crowley his cup, and that was all it took. Crowley’s crossed arms and pinched demeanor melted away with that smile, and at his first sip of coffee, he cracked a smile in return. A real one, too, full of far too much emotion for a simple favor. _

_ But it had always been like that, hadn’t it? It just usually went the other way. Crowley dipping in and out of London like a swan, always gliding away gracefully when things got too messy or emotional for his tastes. But he’d been returning with alarming frequency, and it was getting harder to pass off as part of his job. It helped that every kind of trouble seemed to begin its brewing in London, but even Crowley couldn’t pass off the opening of the Royal Observatory (est. 1675, as the plaque by the entrance proudly proclaimed) as something evil. It was a feat of technological brilliance- and the prime meridian passed right through it. Sometimes Crowley thought that the legions of the occult didn’t give humans nearly enough credit. _

_ It had been a long time, but he still enjoyed looking at the stars, and was overwhelmingly pleased when other people did so as well. He knew the humans found solace in them, and the patterns they found were far more imaginative than his had ever been. He’d focused on the  _ rightness  _ he’d felt when he grouped them together, not any logical pattern. _

Ineffable _ , whispered a voice in the back of his mind. _

_ They stood back from the crowd, just watching the humans and their creations. They were rather beautiful like this, Crowley mused. Excited about creating, learning. He remembered when he’d felt that- the fire in his very core, when every new thing he’d created had fed it, made it stronger. _

_ He’d looked over at Aziraphale then, who’d been sipping his coffee with relative delight. “You’ve really got to hand it to them, haven’t you?” _

_ “Yeah, this coffee is better than the first ones. Actually,” Crowley said, draining his cup, “it’s really good.” _

_ “I meant the Observatory, but yes, I suppose you’re right,” Aziraphale said with a keen glance at Crowley. “Although I still prefer chocolate.” _

  
  


It was just like that, wasn’t it? Here they were, Aziraphale doing something  _ nice _ for Crowley simply because he needed it. He glanced furtively at the angel, realizing finally that he had remembered the coffee from his comment on that particular occasion. If Crowley had a memory like that, he could- well, he could probably have done a lot of things.

The grief crashed back over him, and a sob escaped his lips. 

It was a dry, half-formed thing, and it hung in the air as Crowley squeezed his eyes shut and clamped his hands around the mug in his hands. 

He heard Aziraphale pull himself from his chair, and a moment later, he felt a tap on one of his hands. Cracking open an eye, Crowley found himself being tugged over to a couch, where Aziraphale pushed him down gently and sat beside him. Crowley turned away and leaned forward, elbows on his knees, scrubbing his face with his hands. It was only then he realized he was bereft of his usual sunglasses.

Another sob fought its way out of his throat. 

Hands, light but firm, found their way to his shoulder blades. Aziraphale began to knead gently at the knots in his back, working all the way up to his neck and back down to his ribcage. 

Crowley breathed in.

He breathed out.

_ Slow.  _

_ He could do slow. _

It took a long time for Crowley to get over the loss of Queen’s leading performer enough to function correctly. He suspected, somehow, that he would never really be over it, but he held out hopes that one day he would be able to listen to their music without needing to have a long nap afterwards. Aziraphale had been an endless source of positivity by providing him with an endless stream of warm beverages and endless (but nonetheless enjoyable) readings of  _ The Lord of the Rings _ , and so it was some time before Crowley remembered that Aziraphale had firsthand knowledge of grief.

_ He’d arrived, suddenly, on Crowley’s doorstep on the morning of November 30th, 1900. Despite the hour being around 11 o’clock, a time when most respectable angels and bookshop sellers alike were awake and professionally attired, Aziraphale’s light hair was mussed as though he’d slept badly on it, and his eyes were rimmed with red and welling up with tears. _

_ Crowley had let him in, of course. There was nothing in Heaven or Hell that could have convinced him to do otherwise. Sure, they were in the middle of their longest feud to date, but Crowley would be damned if he was going to let that stop him from trying to help a tearstained and numb Aziraphale. _

_ When Crowley had probed him gently for the source of his woe, Aziraphale had said only “Oscar,” and let a tear fall, his lips wobbling. Crowley hadn’t known what to do with this small bit of information which didn’t help him identify the problem in the least, so he’d supplied Aziraphale with a blanket, tea, and his most comfortable chair, and sat by him as he stared out at the grim November fog. _

_ As the hours had stretched, and Crowley’s bones ached from sitting hunched up all day, he’d decided to unfurl his limbs. After a quick word to his silent mourner, he padded swiftly to his bedroom, tucking away a stray jacket or two and fluffing the pillows on his bed. He returned to Aziraphale, and when his attempts at communication were futile, he’d hoisted him up out of his chair and laced their fingers together in order to lead him to the bedroom.  _

_ With Aziraphale safely tucked in bed, (eyes closed and back to the windows) Crowley retreated to the far corner of the room, where he could slink into the shadows and watch over him.  _

_ He must have dozed off, however, for when morning peeked in the next day, and Crowley cleared the sleep from his eyes, he found only an empty bed and a note that read simply:  _ “Thank you.”  _ in Aziraphale’s flowing script.  _

_ The next few years, Crowley saw very little of the angel, and it seemed things had returned to normal in their feud. It was only on the night of the bombing of the church in 1941, after Crowley had burst into the church on that flash of intuition that he next saw the evidence of that cold November day. Crowley had come in to the bookshop for a few minutes scattered and breathless conversation, and he’d seen them. Row after row of mint first edition Wildes.  _ The Picture of Dorian Gray _ ,  _ The Happy Prince, The Importance of Being Earnest, The Nightingale and the Rose, The Star-Child, The Young King, A House of Pomegranates, Lord Arthur Savile's Crime, The Ballad of Reading Gaol.  _ The list went on and on, shelves and shelves of books and pamphlets in perfect condition, and finally, Crowley understood.  _

Loss was a language Aziraphale was fluent in. So he’d stood by Crowley, as Crowley had tried to do for him, all those long years ago. 

Loss should have been the theme of Crowley’s life, and yet here he was, against all odds, moving on. Perhaps this was just the way it was- certainly it was for the humans. And here Crowley was, learning how from the best of them.

Perhaps this was just the way the world worked. All breakneck turns and flying past trees made of shadow things until the car stalls and you have to walk for a while in the dark. That was alright, Crowley thought- you could see all sorts of unusual things on a walk by the road. The stars were always so beautiful through the trees, anyway.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhh I hope you got through this one alright! Let me know what u think, drop me a kudos or come talk to me on tumblr!


	4. In The Space Between

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title credits: "Lose It" - Oh Wonder

“Let’s go on a drive.”

Crowley, who was reshelving books on a top shelf, stretching on his toes as much as he could, almost dropped a massive edition of the ‘E’ encyclopedia on his head. He tipped it  _ up up up _ and when it finally slid into place, he turned around, wiping dust off his hands.

“You  _ what _ ?”

Aziraphale, resolutely not looking at him and simultaneously not being remotely helpful in the reshelving department, repeated himself.

“Let’s go on a drive.”

“Sure,” said Crowley, blinking. “I mean, yeah. Do you have somewhere in mind?”

“No.” Gazing out the window at the busy street, Aziraphale seemed to come to some sort of conclusion. “Yes.”

“Okay then.” Crowley picked up his sunglasses from a table nearby and slid them onto his face. “Where to, angel?”

They ended up in a field lined with great, spreading beech trees. Aziraphale hadn’t told him why they were here, only given him quiet directions every few miles. As they left the confines of the city, (Crowley only smirking to himself a little when they passed over the M25) the clouds lifted, and by the time they had parked at the edge of a clearing of trees just outside of [place] the sun was high and hot on their faces.

Aziraphale stood several feet ahead of Crowley, hands wide to the heavens above his head, head tipped back. He breathed deep and smiled. Crowley stared at him. He looked up, too, as if he were missing something. He squinted. Against the deep blue sky, a sparrowhawk circled, crying out mournfully.

_ Call down the hawk. _

It was an old phrase, and it recalled an itch in the back of Crowley’s mind. Something to do with Ireland. A shape-shifter. A legend. 

“Fintan MacBochra,” Crowley breathed. He blinked.  _ Where did that come from? _

“What?” Aziraphale was turning, lowering his arms.

But Crowley had remembered. The first man in Ireland; he lived for five thousand years, taking the form of birds and beasts alike and passing on their wisdom and songs for generations. He had always liked legends of creation, and of change that humans created to tell their own story of how things were. 

There had been a song, of course. Layered and deep and full of melodies too old to belong out in the bright sunlight of a June day in the year the world falsely turned two thousand. If he closed his eyes, he could still hear it, a trembling symphony just beneath the grass. 

He listened.

There was silence but for the hawk’s cries and the lazy buzz of insects bumbling through the tall, dry grass.

And then, so quietly that he almost missed it- a sweet, lilting tune, blinking in and out as though it wove through the very breeze. He sucked in a deep breath, his heart filling with joy, and some simpler emotion he thought was called-

Peace.

Crowley opened his eyes.

For a moment he watched the hawk before it winked out into the distance, its call still lingering in the heavy summer air.

Aziraphale was looking at him, eyes oddly bright. “You heard it, didn’t you?”

His voice was thick when he answered, “Yeah. Yeah, I did. Not since-” Crowley took off his glasses and swiped at his eyes. “Not since Eden. It was new, then. Brighter, I guess.”

“Yes, it’s gotten darker, hasn’t it?”

“It has,” he said, thoughtfully. “Hey, wait a moment,” Grass tickled gently at Crowley’s legs, and he fought the urge to slap it away. “You can hear it all the time, can’t you?”

Aziraphale looked away, his gaze slipping out over the trees that lined the wide field. “Most days. Some days it’s… weaker. Like something in me has gone... dark.” He spoke all this in a broken sort of way that told Crowley far more than his words had.

“I guess we’re both sort of different, now, wouldn’t you say?” He asked. They were several feet apart, still, as though a glass wall stood between them.

There was a moment in which only the only sound was the wind shushing through the grass in great golden waves. Then Aziraphale said, tentatively, as though he were just admitting it to himself, “Yes. Yes, I suppose we are.”

Heart revving up to speed and feet crunching on the dry soil, Crowley stepped forward and held out his hand. 

Aziraphale reached out and took it, and it was as though they were a current, a live wire- and this place, this inexplicable field, was a battery. A hum settled inside each of them, not quite a song, but as though a single string of a harp had been plucked and left to waver in the space between them.

The space between them was an electrified wire, raw and sparking and  _ wild _ and it had always been this and Crowley had always known and now they were  _ alive alive alive _ .

In the Bentely, on the way home, sleepy and drunk on the summer sun, music drifted softly from the speakers.

_ “My soul is painted like the wings of butterflies… Fairytales of yesterday will grow but never die… I can fly, my friends…” _

_ Yes _ , thought Crowley, as Aziraphale snoozed in the passenger seat and dark trees whistled past outside and the stars shone brilliantly above.  _ Yes, that’s right. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! This one was a bit short, but sweet after the last one. :) Comments and kudos are appreciated, as always. Hope you're well.


	5. Follow You Into The Dark

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title credit: "I Will Follow You into the Dark" - Death Cab for Cutie

The hours after the Apocalypse were strangely living things; creatures which hid from the slightest noise, but still reached desperately for the sun. When the dawn of the morning after arrived, and Crowley opened his eyes to find both he and Aziraphale (who was dozing in an armchair by one large window) in one piece, he held his breath. It was this moment, before everything had the possibility to end forever, that he wanted to savor. 

The fresh light streaming into the windows cast a soft glow over his living room, and even the crick in Crowley’s neck from sleeping on his leather sofa couldn’t detract from the tranquility that had settled over the world.

Over  _ his _ world, anyway. He could already hear a siren in the distance, breaking up the morning with its mournful wail. Crowley couldn’t stop the familiar pang of sadness and worry at the sound, but he managed to look away from the window, his gaze falling on Aziraphale’s sleeping face. 

It was such a rare sight to see Aziraphale sleeping, even upright, that Crowley had to sit and drink it in. Every well-worn line was smoothed, and his mouth crept tentatively toward a smile. Everything about him breathed  _ relaxed _ , and Crowley hated to wake him. He knew the perils that lay ahead of them, however, so he swallowed the fond lump that had risen in his throat and rose to lean over Aziraphale’s chair, arms bracketing his lolling head. 

When he did so, Aziraphale opened his eyes, and upon seeing Crowley’s upside down face over his, smiled, crinkling up his eyes. 

“Hi,” he breathed.

Crowley gave him a wink. “Hey there, loverboy. How’d you sleep?”

Blushing, Aziraphale looked around at the lighted room. “Well, I suppose. I didn’t mean to drop off, but I suppose it was a rather busy day, all things considered.”

Crowley pushed off the chair and executed his best saunter towards the kitchen, calling over his shoulder as he went, “It’s not quite over yet! Would coffee or tea suit you best on your day of reckoning?”

“Tea!” Aziraphale shouted as Crowley reached the kitchen.

Several cups of tea and two suspiciously fresh English muffins later, they were on their way to stroll through St. James’ park.

“Feels just like old times, doesn’t it?” Aziraphale asked as they watched a few ducks battle over what looked to be a currant scone. Where they’d gotten it remained a mystery; there was no one else at the park at six-thirty in the morning save a few joggers, who most certainly didn’t have enough pockets to house any scones. 

“Huh? Yeah. I guess it does. Although, we were here just… what, yesterday? Was that yesterday? Two days ago?”

“Yes, but I didn’t have red hair two days ago,” Aziraphale pointed out. 

“No, and you didn’t wear those infernal glasses either,” Crowley added, starting towards a bench further along the path. 

Aziraphale huffed, and it sounded so ridiculous in Crowley’s voice that Crowley vowed never to  _ huff _ again once he got his body back.

_ If _ he got his body back. He clenched his hands to fists, looking out over the park suspiciously, as if Archangels could be hiding among the large trees that lined the periphery. “I wish they would just hurry up and arrest us already.”

Aziraphale’s hand brushed his, just once, before they continued on around the promenade.  _ Careful,  _ it seemed to say,  _ there’s time.  _

There was probably time.

  
  


There was time, Crowley soon discovered. Miles of it. Heaps of time. Oodles, in fact. This last addition to his internal dialogue disgusted him enough that he snapped out of his doze and glared around the bookshop, frightening several customers, who scurried out of the shop, books forgotten.

Crowley removed his sunglasses and rubbed his eyes. God. Oodles? Who was he, Aziraphale? It was possible, he thought, that something about the body switch with Aziraphale had left some sort of permanent imprint on his mind. This explanation, he thought, was  _ far _ more reasonable than the stupid one that involved him having some  _ nice _ qualities. One of those qualities included stopping by the bookshop every day and not leaving until odd hours of the morning to retrieve something or other he’d left at his flat.

Honestly, it would have been easier just to move all his things to the bookshop, but there simply wasn’t room. Aziraphale’s upstairs suite was miraculously roomy, but it wasn’t big enough for both of them.

And Aziraphale had begun dropping hints that he _really_ _wouldn’t mind leaving London all that badly_ , and so Crowley, in his equal parts foresight and anxiety, had secretly begun cottage hunting. For some time, he found nothing to write home about. Sure, there had been charmers, small and large alike, but the one which captured his fancy like nothing else had begun, as it all had, with a snake. 

_ “And here… it is!” said Crowley’s chipper guide, who Crowley was pretty sure was called Robin. It was eight in the morning, and he couldn’t figure out how they were so enthusiastic. Possibly it was drugs, but Robin didn’t look to be the sort; bright, practical sundresses and sensible flats paired with shorn green hair and several colorful minimalistic tattoos didn’t exactly  _ scream _ irresponsibility.  _

_ Crowley rather liked them. They’d gone to several cottages together in his clandestine trips to the country, and he was beginning to feel that ache he got when he remembered how short the time that humans had on Earth really was.  _

_ ‘It,’ as Robin had proclaimed proudly, was a lovely little house complete with blue gabled windows and climbing vines. As they paced through the house, floorboards creaking underneath their feet, Crowley’s mind helpfully superimposed Aziraphale over it all; stretching to tuck an old book lovingly into a bookcase, washing his hands at the large farm sink, and staring out the window toward the garden from an overstuffed armchair, a confection forgotten in his lap. _

_ That  _ tug _ was back, pulling at his heart. And this time, it wasn’t leading to London. It had led him here. _

_ The back door complained as Robin jimmied it open and led them out into the glorious garden.  _

_ The garden was overflowing with tall grass and vines and beautiful flowering  _ Rosa tomentosa,  _ (harsh downy roses,) magnificent  _ Ipomoea purpurea, _ (morning glories), and above it all, a towering  _ Prunus avium  _ (wild cherry tree) swaying gently in the early morning breeze. The whole thing felt transcendent, a warm breath of summer air held cupped in the palms of luck. Crowley closed his eyes, breathed in deep, and tuned his ears to the melody that the garden wove.  _

_ As soon as he opened his ears, he heard it. The mingling, breathy refrain that spoke of new growth, of freshness; the old strains of the trees that knew the strains of the earth by heart; the biting crispness of birdsong; and underneath it all, so deeply present that it might as well have been coming from the earth itself, came the thread steeped in temptation. Pride came first, giving voice to words so familiar they could have been plucked from the listener’s mind. Next came sloth, professing illustrations of languid, peaceful days spent outside, and long, cool nights under clean cotton sheets. It was this thread, this  _ temptation _ , so familiar in its beckoning, that coaxed Crowley’s eyes open. _

_ A thin black snake lay in the grass before him, stretching luxuriously. The long red stripe along its back flexed and flashed in the sun. _

_ Crowley stared at it.  _

_ The snake stared back, holding his gaze.  _

_ After a long moment, it slithered away. _

_ “Oh,” said Robin, at a loss for words for the first time in Crowley’s memory. “Oh. Well. If that’s going to be a problem, we can certainly look at-” _

_ Holding up a hand, Crowley said softly, “This is good. I’ll- I’ll take it.” _

_ Crowley breathed in. He breathed out.  _

_ This was the place. _

_ Robin cracked a peculiar little smile as they scribbled on their clipboard.  _

_ Ineffable _ ,  _ Crowley’s heart whispered. _

He’d prowled through the whole house after he’d bought it, glaring at particularly narrow hallways until they decided it was in their best interest to give the wood floors a little more room. He’d stalked through the garden, searching, in vain, for the snake. After several hours, he’d had to give up, and left for London in the Bentley thinking that snakes had gotten a bit too much of his blasted personality for their own good. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you enjoyed! :) Take care~


	6. We Have It All

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title credit: "We Have It All" - Pim Stones

It was a warm spring day in the lovely South Downs cottage Crowley and Aziraphale had set up as their own. It was old wood and climbing roses and a sprawling garden and it was absolutely  _ full  _ of books.

Slow hadn’t really been all that bad, after all. In fact, since it had led them here, to a place that was  _ just for them _ , Crowley was rather happy it had all turned out that way. Even after everything, after holy water, After Death, (Crowley found it amusing to name it this) and after the apocalypse, it was going to be alright. It was alright, mostly. There were rough days, as in anything. But they weathered them fairly enough, clinging to each other until the brunt of the storm passed and the rain was once again gentle on their heads.

Now, on this lovely spring afternoon, a breeze tousling his hair pleasantly, Crowley watched from the shadows of the wild cherry as Aziraphale ambled distractedly out of the house, nose in a book, wine glass precariously in hand. The sight filled his chest with a particularly undemon-like bubble, bright and comfortable. Stewing in silence under the shadiest tree in the garden had become one of Crowley’s favorite activities as of late; he could watch Aziraphale without the latter getting flustered, and it gave him the opportunity to take out his anger on unsuspecting and slightly wayward plants. 

Crowley gazed at Aziraphale through half-lidded eyes. The book which had caught his fancy that day featured a fiery black circle centered around a red eye- and without even trying to strain to read the title, Crowley knew  _ The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkein  _ was embossed on its yellowing cover. It was a comfort book for Aziraphale, Crowley knew. The angel had been quite close with the author in his day, though Crowley hadn’t been around to see it. There were enough subtleties only an angel would know about God and the World in the lore of the stories to know Aziraphale had gotten involved. 

Sometimes, in the half-light, in the evenings, when Crowley and Aziraphale were winding down in their tiny sitting room, Aziraphale would tell Crowley the stories of the Creation of Middle Earth. (Crowley always liked the implication that there were more Earths. More stories.) Sometimes, when all outside was quiet, and their drinks were long finished, Aziraphale told the story of Valie Varda, and how she had created the stars. Crowley didn’t know much about the actual wording of the story, but in his hearing, it had always went something like this:

_ Before there was time, there was the sun and the moon. Before there was the sun and the moon, there were the stars. Before the stars, there was Valie Varda, and she was about to create them.  _

_ It took her a long time to create them. Breathing life into dark space, creating something from nothing; these things are not nearly as easy as they may seem. Once, long ago, someone had asked her what it had been like.  _

_ Valie Varda’s only response was to look away, to escape up into the stars.  _

_ After time was invented, woven into the Great Song of the universe, people wondered at the sky. Especially the Elves. It was said that the stars were the first things the Elves saw when they opened their eyes on Earth, and the first words they spoke were  _ “Behold!”  _ in celebration. _

_ The most splendid of earthly pleasures could never compare to what it had felt like to shape them. Varda felt so alone, afterwards. No one else felt that great  _ pull _ , the incessant hum of life at her fingertips. She had put all of her kindness, her generosity, and her longing into them- and now she wandered the cosmos, little more than a wisp.  _

_ She became a legend.  _

_ A name revered. _

_ History. _

_ Forgotten. _

_ But her creations remained, long after she fell quietly away from time. They remember her, as all things do. She left her fingerprints all over them, if only someone wished to look. _

It was a sad story, Crowley had always thought. To be forgotten in the long passage of time? Was there a crueler fate? Crowley had never known what it was to be dead, for all memory of him to be washed away. But that was what this was about, wasn’t it? Learning from the humans. Learning to be like them; to retire, and fade away. It was sort of pleasant, if one looked at it that way, Crowley supposed. 

He waited until most of the light had vanished from the sky before retrieving a few pastries from inside the house and returning to lurk near Aziraphale, waiting for him to notice he’d slithered away from his post beneath the cherry tree. Aziraphale, true to form, didn’t look up. At this rate, they’d be here all night and most of the morning.

Crowley cleared his throat. His heart pounded.

“I have a story to tell you.”

Aziraphale startled, peering up first at Crowley, then at the darkness around them. He stuck a thumb between the pages of his book to keep his place. “Alright, dear. Do you want to sit down?”

“No.”

“Alright.”

Crowley huffed, and grabbed at Aziraphale’s hand and led him to a patch of grass illuminated by the setting sun.

Fidgeting, Crowley looked at the ground. “We did the Ritz. We danced, even. Disastrously. But…” He trailed off, stubbornly leveling his gaze at the dimming rooftops past the garden walls. 

Aziraphale stayed quiet, watching.

With an effort, Crowley composed himself. “But. I’ve never told you how I hung the stars.”

“Oh, darling, you don’t have to.” Aziraphale laid a hand on his arm.

“No,” Crowley agreed. Taking a deep breath, he looked up at Aziraphale.. “But I want to.”

“My ears are yours, my dear.”

Crowley pulled Aziraphale to the grass in one fluid motion, and they toppled together unceremoniously. A huff of breathless laughter escaped Aziraphale as Crowley pulled him closer. Finally, settling down with Aziraphale’s head resting on Crowley’s chest, Crowley raised a hand to point up at the sky.

“Do you see that one, there? The one that’s kind of dim, but next to that big, bright one?”  
Aziraphale nodded, and his hair tickled Crowley’s chin. 

“Well, um. That was the first one.”

Aziraphale’s gasp made Crowley twist his mouth into a tiny little joyous smile. Pride, indeed.

“Yeah. And, uh, the bright ones next to it- those were… the next ones. Figured I’d make them closer, I guess. And brighter. Hotter, too. Miles away from the first one, though. Always wondered if they’d have been better off… closer together. But I guess there’s all that stuff about ‘stars colliding’ so maybe I don’t have to worry about that.” Now that he was talking, it was easier to keep going. He pointed out other stars, nebulas that he’d grouped and made glow.

“Oh, yeah, and that one? Between those two I just talked about? I was really pissed about something or other, probably about some Archangel talking shit and being extra… I don’t know… heavenly. That’s why it’s so bright. I guess I’ve always been angry, I just didn’t know it. Not sure if there even was a word for it. I got over it though, that time. For this.”

A hand tangled in his. Crowley looked down at Aziraphale. His eyes were bright. When he spoke, his voice barely scraped a whisper.

“Tell me how it felt, when you made them.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi ! Thank you ever so much for reading. Let me know if you enjoyed it! Stay safe.


	7. It's How We All Began

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title credit: "Dream State" - Son Lux

It had been dark out, when Crowley had made the stars. He’d just wanted some time alone- away from Heaven, away from all the other angels. There was something about their unquestioning devotion that felt… off. 

Didn’t they wonder? Didn’t they ask why they had been created? In their long hours of repose, didn’t they ever cast their thoughts around to God for answers? At first, Crowley had thought everyone wondered, from time to time. Then, as he wandered through Heaven, speaking to other angels, he found that not to be the case. Many angels hurried away from him, or pressed flowers or other beautiful things upon him, as if they could distract him from the  _ questions. _

So he’d come outside. For a minute. To breathe. He wasn’t sure if that was something he really did, or if it just sounded right- and in any case, he needed it. He’d been getting far too many stares recently. All the eyes were getting to him.

As he gazed out over the inky blackness, a thought occurred to him. 

_ If there could be light in Heaven,  _ he thought,  _ why can’t there be light out here too?  _ It seemed unfair that Heaven got all the light and all the space out here was dark. Also, it would be warm out here if he ever needed to come back.

So he cast about for some hopefulness, his hands folding together they held each other, at the center of his chest, one hand curled about another thumb. 

He folded the hope in between his hands, and, closing his eyes, reached out for happiness. Memories of fair hair and of large fingers trailing up his arms brought heat to his cheeks, and he added them to the warmth growing between his fingers. 

He existed there for a while, drawing together eagerness and passion and intensity and braiding it all together in a harmony that lit a fire in his chest. 

Oh, how he loved the light.

Cracking open his eyes, Crowley drew his gaze to the glow beneath his fingers. When he unfurled his hands, a pulsing sphere of light sat nestled in his palms. Cupping his fingers carefully, Crowley blew a breath into them. The light shivered and expanded, its heat a gentle flicker against his skin.

Crowley cupped his hands _tight_ _tight tight_ , his arms shaking with the effort, until he could feel the energy compress into something giddy, the light within eager to get out.

Still holding on firmly, Crowley closed his eyes and stretched out his consciousness to search the dark sky for a suitable place for a beautiful thing. When he reached a portion that felt more friendly than the others, (though Crowley thought he was probably imagining it) he opened his eyes. It was far, far away from where he was, but that didn’t matter. It meant he could look up and see it from anywhere he wanted.

Bringing his locked hands up to his face, Crowley took a deep breath. On the exhale, he opened his hands.

A brightness, the likes of which Heaven had never seen blinded him for a moment, before he registered the  _ colors _ . They were far from any he had ever seen before- and they were lovely in the way that hurt to think about.

His eyes were wide and glassy, and his fingertips trembled; he was held, spellbound, in that heady fever of creation all the more beautiful for its spontaneity.

Crowley breathed in. He breathed out.

He smiled, and it was a beautiful thing. Like honey, or deep, golden 5 o’clock sunlight.

Crowley tossed the light far into the darkness, every fibre of his being attuned to its path. When it reached the friendly darkness, Crowley returned to himself. 

Distance faded the glorious, otherworldly colors to white, but the feeling of  _ hope _ was a wildfire in the dark. A pinprick in the fabric to another, brighter world beyond.

_ Star.  _

The word came to him as he drank in the sight. Beautiful, everlasting, and unreachable. But  _ steady _ in a way nothing else ever really was.

Crowley closed his eyes, plucking his fingers to the rhythm of the universe, pulling light from himself, wrapping it in  _ hope _ and  _ love _ and  _ joy _ and  _ contentment.  _

When his eyes fluttered open, light flickered in his vision. A dozen stars, hanging in the air. 

He laughed, the sound bubbling up out of his throat and into space. The stars doubled, and he laughed again, drunk on that first wine, creation.

Fluttering his fingertips swept the stars together, where they buoyed and tumbled over one another, never touching. 

A noise escaped him then, raw and full of emotion. 

_ He was incendiary, and he was going to set the sky alight. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think this was my favorite one to write. Let me know what you think!! <3 Hope you're well.


	8. Just Like A Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Chapter title credit: "Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy" - Queen, of course. 
> 
> Enjoy. Thanks for coming on the ride with me~

When he’d finished telling his story, there were tears running down Aziraphale’s cheeks. The dark garden was still around them, an otherworldly hush filling the air as even the crickets paused to listen to Crowley’s tale of creation. 

“Could you describe the colors to me?” Aziraphale asked, voice wet.

“Oh, they were  _ magnificent _ , angel.” Crowley replied, his words crackly. “Nothing like you’ve ever seen.”

“Do go on.”

Crowley ran a hand through Aziraphale’s hair. “I… I’m not sure how.”

“Then show me.” Aziraphale whispered, shifting to face Crowley.

Crowley closed his eyes, and when their mouths connected, all hot breath ghosting over cool skin, the first colors of the stars burst behind his eyes in a wild and brilliant tempest.

  
  


Later, they would wander into the house, tuck themselves up in their rather magnificent four-poster, and forget that the world was larger than the space between their mouths.

Later, they would cling to each other, a rhythm of easy breath flowing between them, their hands pressed into hair and cheeks, as if even in sleep, they longed to know the other was real.

Later, when the sun broke in effervescent glory over the trees through their window, and the stars faded from view, Aziraphale would stretch and Crowley would smile and squint and force out a grumble about the early morning.

They laid in bed for hours, that morning, trading smiles and quips and kisses, until Aziraphale pulled back with his Sneaky Bastard face, and Crowley automatically braced for the worst.

Instead, Aziraphale leaned close, close enough that Crowley could count his eyelashes, and whispered, “What happened when you met Freddie Mercury, darling?”

Crowley threw a pillow at him, expecting that to be the end of it. When it wasn’t, he huffed and made a variety of noises that usually got him out of explaining things. When they didn’t, he buried himself under the covers and waited. 

Aziraphale sighed and clambered out of bed. His footsteps padded out of the room, and for a while, were silent. Crowley had almost dozed off by the time Aziraphale returned, puffing, and carrying an enormous record player.

Crowley sat up and stared at him in amusement, all indignance forgotten. “What’s that?”

Aziraphale wiped his brow. “Record player.”

“Why is it up here?” Crowley asked, bemused.

In answer, Aziraphale placed the needle on the record and the crackly first notes of Queen’s  _ Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy  _ emerged from the speaker. 

Crowley could feel his face burning, and he dropped his head back against the wall behind him in defeat.

“You didn’t.”

“I’m not saying  _ anything _ .” 

“Did you actually-” 

“What I can’t believe,” Crowley drawled, regaining some of his composure and raising his head to look at Aziraphale, “is how  _ bloody long _ it took you to figure it out.” 

“I figured  _ something  _ was up the day it played in the Bentley on the way home from the art museum, actually.” Aziraphale said with a proud little wiggle. “But I really didn’t know for sure until later, when I realized you’d actually known him.

“Then why did you _ask_?” Crowley half-shouted, flinging his arms out for emphasis.  
Aziraphale’s smirk said it all. 

There was silence except for the record player as Crowley tried to plot the most efficient way to deliver posthumous revenge on Freddie for his meddling.

_ “...and tell me how do you feel right after-all… I'd like for you and I to go romancing, say the word, your wish is my command… Ooh love ooh loverboy...” _

“I always knew you were a romantic, deep down,” Aziraphale said, smugly, “I just wanted to make you say it.”

“Shut up.” 

But really, if he was honest, it was the happiest Crowley had ever been. And if the stars shined a little brighter after that, well, that was for the humans to work out. Crowley was too starry-eyed to mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well. Thank you endlessly for reading!! This fic has been my baby for several weeks now, and I'm so glad to have finished it to my satisfaction. :) I hope you liked it. Comments and kudos are lovely, and you can also talk to me on tumblr!! 
> 
> Stay safe, and take care of yourselves.


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